In honor of the Ginger Snap Lara BarI tried over the weekend, I added a new addition to my oats today: ground cloves. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the warm flavor, and knew it would be a nice addition in my morning oats. Cloves remind me of the winter holiday season where items like dried fruit, nuts and spices are staples in every meal and dessert. I wanted something hearty, creamy, dynamic and sweet to start my day so I decided to make Banana Fruit Cake Oats: 1/3 cup almond milk, 1/3 cup water, 1 sliced banana, nutmeg, cinnamon, vanilla extract, 1/8 tsp ground cloves, 1/4 cup rolled oats, 2 TBS oat bran, 1/2 TBS chia seeds, 1 chopped Medjool date, 1 chopped apricot, 1/2 TBS dried cherries, 1/2 TBS dried cranberries, 1/2 TBS raisins and 1 TBS natural almond butter. I added the milk, water, spices and 1/2 of the banana (reserve other half for top) into a small sauce pan until it starts to boil. I reduced the heat and added the oat bran, oats and chia seeds for about 8 minutes and topped with the dried fruit, banana slices and almond butter. Oat bran is a new product for me. A few weeks ago I was adding about 2 TBS of instant oats (an attempt to get rid of them) to my rolled oats and noticed that they added a lot more volume and creaminess to my bowls. I wanted to find a product that would give this same feel, and the fine grind of oat bran did the trick! This was delicious and SO filling. I had small apple mid-morning but this held me over for hours!

For lunch I was oddly craving hummus and carrots. I made a big spinach salad using: spinach, 1 large grated carrot, 2 inch piece of an English cucumber, 1/2 Roma tomato, 1 stalk of celery, 3 white button mushrooms sliced, clover sprouts, hummus, goat cheese and hot sauce. I really like the addition of hummus to big salads, and always put ~2 TBS right on top of the clover sprouts to spread it around. It is such a delicious combination. On the side I had a handful (plus a few pre-photo!) of Food Should Taste Good The Works! Chips. I’m not really a big chip person, but I do like blue tortilla chips and fancy chips from time to time. This company makes so many “different” chips including sweet potato and chocolate! I saw that The Works was a mixture of caraway and poppy seeds, minced garlic and onion and HAD to pick them up. I love the flavors of caraway and poppy and haven’t had them in a long time. These chips were a bit salty but paired nicely with the hummus and hot sauce. After lunch I needed something sweet to cleanse my palate and had 1 sliced kiwi, 2 sliced frozen strawberries and Chobani Greek Yogurt; light and refreshing.

I just found out that I won’t be able to attend the Passover dinner with my friend tonight. I’m a little bummed because I was looking forward to experience her religion and see the traditions, but I received an exciting little something-something in the mail today that might make an appearance around dinner time!

Creative Thoughts,

Nora

If you are an oatmeal person: what types of oats do you use and what are essential ingredients in the base of your oats?

Carpe Diem! Sundays are supposed to be a day of rest, a day to catch up on things and rejuvenate yourself before another whirlwind week. To me, one of life’s guilty pleasures is to wake up well rested on a Sunday and have a full day to reflect, relax and take care of myself. Sunday was always such a special day growing up. We would go to Church as a family and come home to a wonderful breakfast consisting of gigantic omelets and toast, strawberry Belgian waffles with whipped cream, pancakes or french toast all compliments of my dad…aka the breakfast man. It was the one meal a week he would (could) cook and he has perfected his craft over the years to truly make his creations art work worthy. We would proceed to do work until about 5pm when we would reconvene for a cozy early Sunday dinner prepared by my mom. It was such a special day. I often reminisce and cherish Sunday because of the sentiment of home that I have attached to it. Now that I am on my own I try to make lavish breakfast spreads (never as good as my dad’s) or take the day completely to myself.

This morning I woke up well rested and ready to conquer the day. I enjoyed the quite of the morning and as I gazed out the window I saw a blue sky and blaring sun! This never happens where I live, so I decided to take advantage of this gorgeous day and treat myself well. I prepared a light breakfast of Raspberry Chobani,ginger granola and an apple, and headed out the door for an 1 hour and 15min Vinyasa yoga class.

The Greek yogurt was exactly what I was craving. It had a nice raspberry flavor and was extremely creamy. It lacked raspberry pieces, which in this instance I actually prefered because raspberry seeds are so miniscule that they become an annoyance often getting stuck in my teeth. Ginger and orange is probably my favorite combination, but it added a nice spice to the sweet/tartness of the raspberry. Breakfast is never complete in my book unless I’ve had a piece of fruit, so I had a big crunchy Jonagold to go with this breakfast snack.

Yoga was fantastic, and exactly what I needed. I love how in tune it makes me feel with my body, and the peace that it gives me. It is exercise that doesn’t feel like exercise and gives me some perspective on life. The instructor repeatedly said, “let it flow” through out class, which was especially meaningful to me today. Every studentin the room makes yoga their own, but the phrase “let it flow” is one that I find I need to take more literally in my life. It is so easy to get caught up in life and become anxious about what comes next. Sometimes you just have to step back and realize that things will happen the way they are supposed to and can not necessarily be planned…you just have to let life flow and reveal itself to you. (Wow that was very deep of me.) The studio is attached to a boutique and juice bar (**side note how cool would it be to own a healthy cafe/ juice bar?!**) and I decided to treat myself to their “Protein Punch” smoothie and a homemade energy bar for later. My Peanut Butter and Jelly Bliss smoothie was based on the description of this, so I had to compare and contrast. Their smoothie incorporates peanut butter, dates, banana and chocolate soy milk. It was delicious, with an extremely potent peanut butter flavor, BUT my smoothie wins! The dates were not as sweet and flavorful as the frozen raspberries, and adding greek yogurt made my smoothie creamier.

Protein Punch in Car Cup Holder...had to take a picture before I inhaled!

I ended up taking this chocolate milk shake protein smoothie to Barnes and Noble and attempted to get some real work done. Despite the protein punch packed into this, smoothies never REALLY fill me up, and I broke into the energy bar shortly after I finished it.

Energy Bar on Notes

It was a bit crumbly but really good. It had MORE peanut butter, sesame seeds, goji berries, dried cranberries, rolled oats, coconut and rice puffs (things that I guessed were in it, there was not an ingredients list). The star ingredient in this bar was the sesame seeds. For something so small the pack huge flavor and nutrition. I’m considering making an energy bar of my own and these will surely be in the mix!

After three hours, and no outlet for my computer 😦 I decided to call it quits and head back home. When I got back, I had my new favorite snack: 1/2 cup 4% cottage cheese with chopped cucumber, broccoli and hot sauce along with a kiwi and a chocolate rice cake (I know….gross rice cakes. Honestly I never eat them but they were a spontaneous purchase from our campus corner store and I wanted a sweet crunch.). It’s been a bit of a snacky Sunday I suppose. The rest of the afternoon I plan on more work, olympics, and making a home cooked fish dinner.

Missing Home,

Nora

What traditions did you have growing up that you kept in your life as you got older?

I suppose I’ll be a repeat “food diary” blogger today since it is Deja Vu Wednesday. I wanted to post once more today about my fantastic…or should I say “snacktastic” afternoon snack, but I have documentation of other daily eats so why not?

When I last left you I was on cloud 9 relishing in my PB&J Bliss smoothie, which held me over until lunch time around 1pm. In recognition of Lent I had a meat-free lunch of a plain tortilla (usually go for whole wheat but it was this or really hard gross flavored wraps….YAY college food) smothered with a mound of hummus, lettuce, tomato, snap peas, black olives and carrots.**Please feel free to laugh at the picture you are about to see….it was a quick dining hall shot, and not my best effort.Also, please notice the awesome floor tiles.**

I ended class around 3:30, and had some down time before heading to the bakery at 4:30. I wasn’t that hungry, but decided to be a snacker since I probably wouldn’t have a dinner break until 7:30. I ate another unpictured apple (will two a day REALLY keep the doctor away haha) and this SNACKTASTIC creation:

1/2 cup Chobani Greek yogurt, one Kiwi sliced and halved, 1 TBS Bear Naked Oat and Honey, 1 TBS Kopali Organic Mix. I had their Dark Chocolate Cacao Nibs on Valentine’s Day but have never had this before. It is composed of dried goji berries, mulberries, pistachios and cacao nibs. WOW. It was slightly spicy (goji/mulberries tend to give off that flavor) and tart. It went so well with the cool yogurt and sweet kiwi. The granola added crunch and more sweetness from the dried blueberries. I’m on a food-composition roll if you ask me!

Dinner was a ginormous salad of everything in my fridge aka: Kale, squash 1/4 avocado, 1/2 a Roma tomato, cucumber, mushrooms, sprouts and red bell pepper with a side of left over wood fire margarita pizza from my Valentine’s romantic date.

And then…I just want to note that I do not typically do this…I ate a chocolate chip cookie from the kids cookie jar at work. Hey, we aren’t all perfect and like I’ve said before, I always need something sweet at the end of my meals.